Culture and Library Commission meeting of June 17th, 2025 to order.

Please take the roll call.

Chair Scotland.

Present, and I need to let you know for the minutes that I yield this meeting to Vice Chair Miller.

All right, thank you.

Vice Chair Miller.

Present.

Commissioner Alvarez.

Commissioner Cassidy.

Commissioner Gillary.

Present.

Commissioner Ridsdale.

Present.

Commissioner Smith.

Present.

And Commissioner Velazquez.

Present.

We have six in attendance.

So the quorum is met.

Great.

Do I read the headings or uh you could just read the what it says chair will announce?

Oh.

So there are no announcements.

So moving on to item three, consent calendar.

Can I get a motion to approve the minutes of May 20th, 2025?

If so move.

Second.

Great.

Any discussion.

Not.

Here again, all those in favor.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay.

Seeing no more discussion.

Uh we can motion carry.

It's a lot of uh if this then that.

Yes.

All right.

So moving on to item four, library services staff report and announcement.

All right, thank you very much.

Um I have a number of things I want to talk with the commission about.

Starting with a reminder that the comedy festival is this weekend.

Um so if you would uh take a copy.

Okay.

I think it's like questions.

Okay, so just a reminder that we have the comedy festival this weekend.

Uh so instead of just the one show, which we've done traditionally, we have three shows since the festival, and uh the flyer just uh highlights those three shows.

The first one is Friday the 20th, 7 p.m.

at the Historic Paul Theater, featuring five comedians, and then on Saturday, June 21st at 6 p.m.

will be the traditional um what we refer to as comedy in the plaza, uh this time comedy festival here at the main library.

Again, starting at six and featuring five comedians, and then for those who uh have a more uh flavor for a little later show, Saturday, June 21st, 8 30 p.m.

at the 21st Amendment brewery featuring five comedians.

So super excited have been promoting this like crazy, and I hope that you'll be able to attend at least one of the shows.

Yeah, I'll be here.

Okay.

All right, so the next thing that I wanted to discuss, part of why I have a computer up there, is the budget.

So I'm going to move down to the computer here so I can talk you through this.

Okay.

Actually, before I do that, I just need to give a commissioner update that Commissioner Seo has resigned.

So uh the appointee of the Councilmember uh Speiday uh Swalton will be looking for a replacement.

So and has um someone in mind.

So that said, so I thought it'd be appropriate to talk about the budget that was just passed by the city council, um, it was passed last evening, uh and it is for fiscal year 26 and 27.

So as I had mentioned in an email which is a commission, the proposal was to reduce the line item for public art, which is in the library department's budget, which is the line item that we commonly refer to as the commission's budget from 75,000 annually to 50,000, and that was accepted.

So that is what we'll have for fiscal year 26 and for fiscal year 27 is 50,000.

So to put that in context, what we're looking at here on the screen, did you realize this?

Let's see, hopefully it'll be on the screen.

This is what was presented at the city council meeting on June 2nd.

And so this is 116 page presentation.

I will not go through 116 pages, but I'll spare you that.

But I wanted to give you a context of what we've been working on for the past several months to get to those numbers that I just mentioned.

So this is a bit of background.

We started budget planning in November of last year.

And again, the city does a two-year budget.

So we're looking at fiscal year 26 and fiscal year 27.

They started that practice some years ago.

And sorry, went too far.

Okay.

Oh, sorry.

So after approximately six months of budget planning, and I had updated the commission on our our the work that we were doing, we had looked at the guidance was around two to four percent in terms of making reductions, and so we've been working on that for months, and as would all the other departments, and we went to the commission, sorry, the commission, the finance committee, which is a subset of course of the city council on April 23rd and presented what we were looking at as far as cutting the budget, and so the feedback that we got from the finance committee at that time was this is not sufficient, and uh the direction was as you see here.

Is that expenses should be equal to projected revenue?

So uh what that means is that the city's been relying on uh reserves, what they call the fund balance, to balance the budget because we have to have a balanced budget, and so the guidance from the from the finance committee was we can't rely on that.

We need expenses and revenues to match, which is a very heavy lift.

That meant much deeper cuts.

So with that in mind, just a little bit because it will be helpful.

I think to understand a little bit about what we're talking about with the fund balance.

So this is a little description of the fund balance, the top line.

The fund balance represents the difference between the city's total assets and the current or future liabilities.

Essentially, shows the net available resources in that fund at any given point in time.

So the way I think of this is like a savings account, right?

If you've got your expenses and your your income, and then you've got your expenses.

If you if you if those don't match, then you can you have your savings account, which you can dip into sort of the fund balance, and then I want to go to this next slide, which talks about uh what the fund balance uh policy is.

So if you look here on this lower section, the city set a policy for the fund balance some many many years ago, and so the idea is you put aside five million dollars for major emergencies, like such such as an earthquake, and then 20% of total expenditures for economic uncertainties.

So that is the policy as to how large the fund balance should be.

And of course, that's going to fluctuate over time.

So the fact that we've been dipping into the fund balance means that we're operating with a structural deficit.

So again, our revenues and expenses are not matching, so you have to reach into your fund balance to draw from it, which is a structural deficit.

So, and they define it here structural deficit is persistent imbalance where a government spending consistently outpaces its revenue, which is what's been done.

Why is this bad?

Because it's unsustainable, and eventually, when all your funds are expended, uh the city is put in a position of filing for bankruptcy.

So this is what the council first again starting with the finance committee wanted to address.

So that was like I said, a much uh more challenging picture.

So I want to take a look at page 13, and I know uh sorry, this is page 11.

So this gives you a sense of the scope of the problem.

It's hard to see.

There's a lot of data here, and it's not as uh clear as I'd like it to be.

I think your key standing is kind of weird too.

What's that?

That's something this is the yeah, that's the focus.

And it was also kind of like half cooked lately.

Yeah.

Sorry, folks.

Okay, that's a little better.

Okay.

Right back here, that's the best minute spends.

Okay, the crazy system.

All right, so there's a lot that's here, by definition.

But what we want to look at as far as again explaining the situation we've been in, this line up here are the revenues.

All the way down here are total expenditures.

Okay.

So you can see, it's hard to see, but the revenues, this is projected for next fiscal year 26.

Revenues 149.7 million, expenditures 159.5 million.

Whoops.

So that means in order to have a balanced budget with those kind of numbers, then we have to dip into the fund balance.

And it's a it's a little hard to see the way they sort of structure this, but under this scenario, the fund balance starts out at 54.7 million.

That's a very healthy fund balance, but then you have to take 9.8 million away.

So you end the fiscal year with 45 million, and then that is what rolls over into the next fiscal year.

You start out with a fund balance of 45 million, but whoops, in 27, we have to cover the difference between our revenues and our expenses by drawing another 10.2 million from the fund balance, and boom, we're down at the end of fiscal year 27 to a fund balance of 34 million, 34.7 million, and this rolls forward, it's a 10-year forecast, until we get to this point where we are now at a point where the fund balance has been exhausted.

So the other thing that it's showing down here is that that 20% requirement that I mentioned as far as what the fund balance should be, is not that's what it's saying it's not met.

It's going below that 20%.

So this is what the numbers look like when we went to the to the finance committee on April 23rd and presented the cuts that we had been working on for six months, and this is what it looked like uh with the cuts in built into the system, and this is why they said no, no, this is not good enough.

So the guidance was stop or line on the fund balance to make up the difference, align your revenues and your expenses again.

That means much deeper cuts because the cuts have to somewhere come around.

That's about 9.8 million.

So that's what we were looking at as far as cuts.

So let's go down to page 12.

So we went back to the drawing board and uh made further reductions.

This is between that was on April 23rd.

We went back to the finance committee.

I have to be out of town, but my colleagues went back to the finance committee on May 12th, presented a proposal that was slightly tweaked, so that we reach June 2nd to the city council, and this is what's presented as far as the revised budget planning that all the departments have gone through in order to meet those to meet that guidance that the finance committee has provided.

So, just say here, okay.

So now the what we see is that we have a a uh revenues haven't changed.

We've imagined 140 149.9 million, uh so the expenses are uh 156.1 million, and the fund balance still is going down, but it's much less than it was before, so you know there's there's an improvement in that, and then they're trying to you know do the same for 27.

In reality, there was not enough time, you know, to really plan out 27.

We did our best to plan out 26, and there so there's more work coming for 27, which we'll deal with in the mid-cycle, which is where the city looks at, uh, and it'll happen around the same time next year where we look at where we are in that two-year budget cycle.

What are we looking at going into 27 and how much deeper do we have to cut?

Because the reality is there will be more cuts coming.

This is just this is what the model tells us, because again, this is better than what it looked like when we went to the finance committee on April 23rd, and so we never, if you look at this, we never exhaust that fund balance, but it gets pretty close.

So the idea is to we have to make further cuts so that we stop you know dipping into the fund balance so deeply, or if at all, I mean that would be the ideal, but again, this is you know what was presented and what the council adopted on um last night.

We're still as early as 2029 not maintaining the fund balance that's required by city policy.

So that's the context for the again.

This is applying to the whole city, that's obviously not just the library.

So let's look at what the library departments need to go to page 16.

Actually, this is actually.

Sorry, this is our cuts, but also a reductions, but also every department show.

So it shows that um again, two-year budget cycle.

So for this upcoming um fiscal year, this is what uh each department is cutting in order to get to reductions of approximately six and a half million.

This is for again just fiscal year 26.

So, you know, that and the way this was approached, and I've never seen it done this way, but I think it's a smart way, is that in the past what the city's done when it's had to make cuts is it's been across the board.

Just here's 10 cut 10 percent, everybody cuts 10%.

This time it's more like we have different needs, different you know, requirements by department, and so the cuts have been much more uh strategic or targeted.

So, so that's why you see, you know, some significantly different cuts as far as different departments.

But our department, the library department is cutting 553,165 in the next fiscal year, and then in 27 plan cuts of 365,505.

So, and as I mentioned, this what's what's planned for 27, we already know it's not enough, so we'll be going back and revisiting that because of that guidance from city councils to stop relying on that fund balance.

So, oh sorry, but what's the significance of parentheses or ones without parentheses?

Oh, number that's actually community development, and I don't know the explanation for this because I I'm not familiar with community development's budget, but they are actually not making cuts.

For some reason, their budget is going up by 119,939 dollars for next year.

I think I saw on a previous slide.

Yeah, I appreciate that.

I didn't want to go.

It's already long enough, but around it to give you the bigger context of what we've been looking at and then what's happening in the library department.

So let's look specifically at um what we are cutting for that.

I have to go to page, go to page 60.

Yeah.

Imagine you folks didn't have to sit through what that one sorts of.

What's your question?

Parentheses mean it's negative, but okay.

We're no one parents is positive.

This is specific to our department, and it shows that what we had to, what areas we had to touch in order to reach our targeted reduction, which is 553,165 for fiscal year 26.

And you can see like there's really the the biggest expenditure for any services department is staff.

Then you have in our you know, our budget's basically broken down into staffing, which is salary and benefits, um, and then we have services broadly, and uh supplies, and then there's something within the city budget which is not addressed here, which is what we call internal service funds.

So, within our budget is a substantial amount of money that we paid to public works to maintain our facilities, and IT to maintain our technology infrastructure.

So, every computer that we own that we have here in the library, whether it's for public or staff, including my little laptop sitting here, is provided by IT, so we pay them a certain amount of money to do that for us.

So, what we have, once you pull those things out, what we have uh accessible to us to you know have some control over is fairly minimal, but this gives you a feel.

So, as I said, we're looking, we've we you know we're talking about reducing uh we're not filling some vacancies, and uh we're reducing uh hours for certain part-time positions, uh we're uh library aids, sorry, um, part-time librarians.

I won't go through all the details, but you can see that as far as the biggest areas of cut, operating supplies, you know, 212,066 in next fiscal year, and then another 64,408 the next the following fiscal year that that's the biggest category, but we've touched basically every area uh within the library's budget to come up with um uh 553 thousand dollar sixty five uh 165 dollars in cuts for 26 and then again another 365 505 for 27 so that is the um that's all the sub all the slides I will share with you because as I think you know gives you a picture of what what's happening in the city and then what happened with the library department so a couple of things about this I want to also mention is the way we're looking at this is we are still delivering services these are cuts but we're still delivering services to the community I mean the initial guidance was try not to touch services uh try to make reductions that don't impact services and again prior to the finance committee's guidance that you cannot rely on fund balance otherwise we will be going bankrupt once once that guidance changed and we had to come to them so we've made those reductions we are still delivering all these services including the services that the funding of public art area um because one of the things that uh has happened is pop some popular programs are gone completely so for example uh one that our one of our I guess it's the public works department does is the beautify San Leandro and you may have noticed maybe a year ago there were some significant changes to our landscaping out front here that was funded through the beautify standard so combination of funding and then volunteer support and that was taken to zero it no longer exists so the good news is that we still have a budget for public art that we still have we're still going to be delivering you know new books and new materials you'll still have um you know the services that we provide for the public it's just going to be reduced so um and then the other thing that I wanted to mention is uh because the challenge of the reductions is what it is we uh gave the city council you know we wanted to present you know as many options as possible and one of the big expenses coming up is the rebuilding of the Mulford Marina Library and so uh we have a grant for that and the city's putting in matching funds of an uh actually a little more not just an equal amount but slightly more uh around the grants just over four million almost 4.1 and the city's putting approximately five million so we were willing to say look if if this is your guidance we can stop this project and which would return that money that the city had allocated for uh its share of the matching grant the matching funds for the grant that could be returned and then put back into those funds that we were looking at because I I went through it rather quickly but there are multiple funds that are not part of the operating budget so for for example uh CIP capital improvement program that is a significant amount of funds and this would the the money for the for the um for the building of a new branch uh would be my understanding is in the CIP but regardless it's millions of dollars the city council said nope we're we're not going to do that we're going to go forward in building a branch library but I'm illustrating that because it's that's how far we were willing to go if necessary to do you know to do or to follow the guidance that has been provided by the city council to stop you know tapping into those funds the fund balance in order to to balance the budget I think uh like I said um you know there will be we just know that there's that the amount that the city came up with for the cuts fiscal year 27 is not sufficient so we'll be looking at additional cuts again based on where we stand right now who knows what the you know what will happen in a year as far as the economic situation would be better could be worse um and so it's just this is where it is it's nobody likes to be in this position but this is where we're at all right Scotland do you have a question?

Yes I do have a question can you set a little context for us if you know it like in terms of the greater bay area is are other cities doing this and having this problem where San Leandro just like bad at being a city like what's going on well I haven't studied other cities but I know that you know the state is certainly making cuts and and so I know that we're not alone in this I but I couldn't speak to I don't know what other cities are going.

I you know now Brian and I were talking about that yesterday the library director and he did mention that Pleasanton and I think he was talking about the Pleasant library was cutting something like 18% from their budget so you know that's one example so I mean it you know it you know certain decisions were made and and in the past and now we're trying to I think the council's direction and that's what we have to go by is to correct that so that is my let me make sure I covered everything that that's my report okay at this time do any members of the public wish to comment on agenda item four you still have more council you still have more commissional questions I think commissioner questions come after we took one I realized I stepped off the script sorry so um seeing as we have no public present the commissioners have any questions or comments so it should be a lot sense thank you um you said pleasant and 18% what was our percentage that 553 number and then the other one so fiscal year 25 the one we're in now I'm doing this from memory so it's approximately nine million and it depends on how you do that calculation but so almost six hundred thousand out of nine million is what's that about five percent six percent yeah yeah so yeah I guess we're not so it's far off like we're not as bad as it could be I guess and that's a that's a good point and I don't quote me on the Pleasanton number I guess I mean we were talking about it from the perspective of you know the library director uh does meet with other library directors on a regular basis and I believe that came up in that conversation and so but I'm not hearing it firsthand so the 18 percent may be too high or too low but but I mean it's still under 10 percent which is significant.

Yeah yeah yeah Commissioner Cassidy.

Yeah um I don't doubt the city has a lot of fiscal challenges but there's different ways to define cut just different ways to look at a budget.

I mean I view this as cuts to spending that the city would have had but it's not actually the new budget doesn't actually decrease the library budget according to the data I have, the fiscal year 25 budget for the library was $9,044 thousand dollars the fiscal year 26 budget is nine million seven hundred and thirty eight thousand what happened was that although many positions were eliminated, they were you know part-time positions and others, everybody else, their salaries increased, their compensation increased.

And what really got hit was some of the service levels.

So, you know, the supplies, the other things.

But the bottom line number is the you know the library budget's going up, and then the next year it's pretty much flat.

That's my understanding, Bill.

Um I mean, I I appreciate there's all those cuts listed there, and those are real.

But I mean, you listed all the things that were being cut, but you didn't the the slide didn't list the things that are increasing.

So the bulk of there is an increase in the library budget, and that's that's the salaries and compensation going to the people that are not that have not been cut.

Um, and I just think that's an important context because I don't think it's accurate to say that the overall library budget's been cut, it's actually been increased.

Um but what has clearly been cut is the budget to this commission, it's been cut by one-third, um, and just so everyone's aware, it was set at $75,000 years ago, and not because of any real analysis as to what it would cost to truly support public art in St.

Leandro.

That was just the number that was given by the then mayor and or more accurately, probably than then city manager.

It's never been adjusted for inflation.

Um, you know, we tried to get an increase.

I was really disappointed that the city manager came back with our you know to our request that we carry over the amount of funds for next year saying no.

So then we were left with you know the choice of either give up that money or donate it to the comedy festival.

I mean, I felt that was disrespectful to the commission because the only reason why there was that extra funds was that we in our due diligence and it being as you know transparent and as um professional as possible determined that the amount of grants that we were going to give that we didn't have enough qualified applications for that.

So, you know, we left money on the table because we were doing our job, and then but that then you know gets told, well, no, you've got to spend it, and we only had this one choice, um, which you know, I mean, our top priorities are the grant program and public art, you know.

But um, so it just it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Um, and um, you know, I mean, what I will say though is the um ultimate you know way to see greater public art in our city is not by competing with everybody else for general fund dollars, but to have a dedicated stream of revenue.

Um I know the mayor's interest in that, but you know, interest in actually achieving something are there's a golf, and so I think if you know each one of you would talk to your council members that appointed you and just say this, like you know, hey, our budget got caught by one third, and it was never an amount that made any sense to start with, and now we're at a much lower amount, and you know, I mean one of the most efficient, so to speak agency in the city.

Um, I mean, you know, the library department is basically allocating staff to our agency, uh, and then all of our money, none of us are keeping any of it, it's all going back into the community, so um, but that's now one-third or less will go back into the community, and I just think you know, this squeaky wheel gets the oil, the arts wasn't valued enough.

Um, I do believe that staff in good faith tried to protect us as much as they could, but got tremendous amount of pressure, and something had to give.

But um it's still only 25,000 out of what 164 million dollar general fund.

I mean, it's like, I mean, you look, you look at the agenda from the other night.

I mean, it's like they allocated a hundred thousand dollars to a private investment firm to advise them on how to properly invest the city's surplus, you know, the whatever it is, the 20 million dollars they got that you know their reserves, so they want professional advice on that.

I understand, but um it's like you know, they'll spend money where they want to spend money.

Um, you know, it's it's not like we're down to eating top ramen raw, you know, here in San Leandro to save on money.

Um, so that that's that's what I'll say.

You know, it's like um I'm just disappointed with um the leadership decisions on some of this here, and um it makes me sad because um I really feel there's tremendous value to what we do and tremendous beyond this is a way to really see our city distinguish itself and be more unique.

Many cities are facing the same problems we're facing, uh, particularly in the Bay Area.

Not every city though, but many.

Um, and that's a much longer reason why.

Um, but as you can see, you know, things you know, things get squeezed within a budget, and and you know we got on the short end of the stick, but our projectory is to be defunded, you know.

I mean, in you know the next few years.

I mean, I mean, that's the trajectory unless we change it, you know.

Well, yeah, yeah, we have money for next year 50 and the following year, but you know, it's we're gonna get eliminated unless we do something different, yeah.

Okay, so um I want to address one important element of what Commissioner Cassidy said.

Um what I want to do in this presentation is explain the cuts that we made, and with due respect, those are real cuts.

And this line item that's again part of a larger budget has been cut.

The other areas that I listed this slide showed that there are similar levels of cuts to important parts of the way we deliver service, supplies.

I mean, supplies include our book budget.

So we those are real cuts, they're not I wasn't saying anything that wasn't accurate.

So I want to be clear about that.

Commissioner Cassidy is also correct in that the city council, and these are their decisions, uh, did approve contracts which increased salary and benefits for a number of different there's different bargaining units within the city.

So that did increase the budget, that was their decision for them to make the same way they decided to go forward, as I said, with uh uh with the um with the new library.

That's that's a commitment to pull funds from the CIP and and spend those funds, and then we're going to face the fact that if you build a building that's three times the size, and then keep the hours at the same level, the community will probably not appreciate that.

So we'll probably have to face that issue as well, which is how do we staff that when the direction that things are going is the opposite.

So there are challenges for sure, but I want to make sure we're clear, these are real cuts, and it's hitting every area within the budget.

It's just decisions were made around um, you know, approving new contracts that didn't increase the salaries and benefits.

So that's true.

If you look at the if you look at the number, it will go up.

But again, that was the city council's choice.

And this, and so that issue which I've come back to, which is the sustainability of our budgetary situation.

The council, uh first the finance committee and then the council decided they did not want to continue operating with a structural deficit and so if those cuts had not been made as I said are real cuts and other every other department with exception of development for next fiscal year made those cuts then that need to draw on that balance on that fund balance would be even higher so while it's you know it's there are things that are um well moving in opposite directions the guidance was to reduce our reliance on the fund balance and that's exactly what this the departments delivered and the city council then approved on Monday so are there any other on this like the slide show presentation we have access to that yes it's on the anytime there's a uh presentation like that um they put it up on meeting central oh okay so you look at a city council agenda it'll it'll have links to every presentation and report that's made so yeah and other questions or comments before we conclude uh I'll just briefly say yes I agree there were real cuts but if all you list are the cuts but don't also list I mean it's that's one side of a coin the other side of the coin was there were also increases and the the bottom line number was an increase I think just to paint the full picture I mean but you know specific to our units you know we're getting hollowed out you know we are definitely getting cut so well I would just turn to a debate but I do want to be clear I was not trying to suggest that those things didn't occur my goal in presenting to this commission was so that they understood that cuts that are being made to the line item for public art is also commensurate with cuts that are being made to other parts of the library budget so that's what the task was you are welcome as commissioner um sorry commissioner Velasquez suggested you're welcome to look at the full presentation I did not want to go through a hundred and sixteen with you but if you would like me to I could do that I just did not feel that was the effective use of the commission's time so I wasn't here for the beginning of your presentation so um I don't mean to put any slant on it because I didn't I didn't hear the introductory part so um I'll just leave my comments as is for I just want to be super clear that what I'm doing is presenting an accurate picture there's nothing that's inaccurate about what I share with this commission.

Thank you for your presentation and welcome this concludes item four so we're moving on to item five public comments.

Seeing as there's no public presence uh I think we can conclude public comments and move on to item six presentations there are no presentations moving on to item seven action items there are no action items moving to item eight commission reports and announcements see so uh moving to yes yeah yeah moving on to item eight a arts endowment committee can we have a report from the arts endowment committee we have not met but it sounds like it's more important than ever for us to meet uh and talk about some stuff for next month agreed okay um at this time do any members of the public wish to comment on the arts Endowment committee.

There's no public present.

Do commissioners have any questions or comments for the arts Endowment committee?

No comments or questions are heard, so moving on to item eight the grants committee.

Can we have a report from the grants committee?

How are we doing, Bill?

Are you hearing anything from they're supposed to give us a like an update as they schedule stuff?

Have there been any of those updates or no?

Um I thought that uh the fruit and course of action would be for me to send a message to all the grantees and just um check in with them because I think you know they have the I believe all the uh money's been distributed at this point.

Uh so now it's a matter of them starting to carry it forward.

So they're probably just getting started on that.

But I think it would be worthwhile to check in.

So I could certainly send a message to them just to check in and see how they're um how their grants are going at this point.

So, and I feel like once we receive that information, we talked about perhaps having a web page on or yeah, webpage on the city website related to the grants with a calendar of events, or maybe we can talk as a subcommittee about what would be the most appropriate way to share out that event info.

But I also don't know how much lead time we need to get information posted on the city website that we could discuss.

Sure.

Okay.

Um any members of the public wish to comment on the agenda item 8b grants committee.

No public is present.

Do commissioners have any questions or comments for the grants committee?

Okay, moving on to commissioner comments.

Do commissioners have any comments or reports?

They do.

Chip Scotland.

Like to report out about the game of shrooms at the library.

So the library staff were super cool, and they did two events on the Saturdays before Game of Shrooms, which was this last Saturday.

They did two mushroom talks.

Um they had some doctor come in and talk about the six top medicinal mushrooms for health, and it was extremely science-y-like super duper like doctor talk science-y.

So kids in the audience.

No, it was all just like nice older ladies, pretty much.

Oh, but like they were into it.

People were super into it, and the staff also had little shrooms that people could decorate there and were passing out information about game of shrooms at the library, and so people came and hid art at the library on Friday evening before close.

Um, Vice Chair Miller hit some art, I hid some art, and other artists came too.

And so on Saturday morning, which was the official Game of Shrooms Day, the mayor came down after hiding an art piece with me out in the city, and then he gave a nice little speech about how much San Leandro values art and community and all of those good things.

Um, it's very sweet.

Off the puff.

And he ran off to spread my oral cheer elsewhere, and there was about like 20 25 people all waiting here for the doors to open so they could come hunt art in the library.

That's great, and it was very well received.

People were happy, it didn't cost all that much money.

Um, and the the creator of Game of Shrooms who lives up in Richmond was was super happy to hear that the library was doing this, and he wants to come down for the library event next year.

So it went really well, and so thank you to all Bill and the city staff, and people stayed late on Friday night and hid art with me, which was fun, and then was here again Saturday morning first thing.

Uh Commissioner Gelasquez.

Yeah, yeah, I saw the picture on social media.

It's it looked pretty good.

I'm sad I missed it, uh, parent duties, but yeah, it was a great turnout, I guess, for our first time.

What?

Commissioner Cassidy.

So is the idea that this might be an annual event?

Okay.

Well, thank you so much for your time and staff's time and making this a success.

I was there on Friday and Saturday morning, and we were kind of lurking in the lobby as people were coming out with what they found, and we had multiple people say how nice it was to have it be more of a community event um where they could encounter other people who were participating in the hunt because I think it tends to be much more dispersed.

Um, so there was I don't know, just like good connection between people um doing this event and getting to interact and talk about their experience.

So they were expressing that.

I think that's an important point.

I mean, just post-COVID, there's such a lack of connections in communities.

It's still playing out.

So that's a nice aspect to this too.

Yeah, there were I I met someone who had found my art at the library, found my art in 2022 that I hit out in the marina.

And someone else came up and said, We tried to get one of your pieces last year, but maybe we can this year.

So, you know, there's there's people who are happy and into it.

Professional strewers.

Dude, my pieces out in the city were gone between five and fifteen minutes after I posted them on Instagram.

People had post notifications on for my stuff because I was the only one hiding in San Leandro, aside from all the stuff at the library, so there was like there were all these people ready to hunt.

I have to go look at your Instagram.

So yeah.

Anyway, it was great.

Thank you.

Thank you.

To add to that, I think um, you know, uh I was explaining to uh to Chair Scotland that um it it's really fun to do these events because we're often, you know, that they they require so much administration and this this required a certain level, but uh it was really gratifying to see that, and something that you know relatively low cost, but then brought some great attention to the to the library ends of the commission, I think.

Um, and I think you know, as I looked at the folks who were standing outside to come into the library to do the search, it was folks who may not typically come to the library, which is because one of the things that we really want to do is try to get people here who you know may not see the library as the resource that we know it to be.

So it was really wonderful.

So I'm thank you for bringing it to the to the library and to the commission.

Of course, and I'm excited about the way we can tweak it for next year.

And I would encourage anyone else on this commission who knows about fun things that we could do, especially things that don't cost money.

Like we're I mean, it's not a sitting around commission, it's a bring fun ideas commission, too.

So okay.

Any other commissioner comments or reports?

I just want to ask a question.

I think it was maybe it was last year where you mentioned um reaching out to the person that does the East Bay history podcast.

And I now I have a new job, that's good.

The bad part is there's a commute.

So uh the good part of that though is I'm listening to podcasts for the first time.

Um and so um I started listening to the East Bay History Line.

Oh my gosh, it's fascinating.

Um whatever happened to that was was there an interest in that or how'd it play out?

Yeah, um, totally blink.

So it's the East Bay Yesterday podcast, and I want to say his name is Ian, but I think I'm getting it wrong.

Uh we had a couple conversations, and I think he was just really looking for ideas of what is like a special historic moment or theme that is San Leandro-centric that he could explore.

And myself as a newer resident, only three years, um, I don't have a deep familiarity with our city's history, unfortunately, so there's a couple things I threw out to him, but I think he's looking for a compelling story.

So if anyone has ideas, I could always reopen the conversation or can we just agendize this for future?

I was gonna say we have we should do that.

Yeah, we need to be careful about talking about things.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, much too much death because it if it's not agendized.

So I think that's the stuff.

We get some feedback from everybody.

I was just if you have a East Bay yesterday's the podcast, and I mean there's some impressive shows on it.

Um, do I need to make a motion to add it to the agenda?

No, I can add a change.

You get to decide that comment.

Um, you recognized.

Yes.

Sorry.

Commissioner Gillary.

Yes.

Several years ago.

Some years ago, we did a show called the um anyway, it didn't matter.

It was a it was a um melodrama, and we set it in San Leandro.

And as a part of that, we researched the history of San Leander, and it is fascinating.

Like I mean, things like just the Altamir Club would be something, you know, how that happened, why, you know, that kind of thing.

So I'm very happy to maybe, you know, impart some background there.

And then you've got the history people here too.

Sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So nope.

Um, yeah, let's talk about it.

Yeah, let's talk about the next meeting and we can reopen that conversation.

Okay.

And I want to say one more thing before we I think I might be the last comment.

Um, earlier when you mentioned Commissioner Cassidy about the 34,000 that we had left over to reallocate.

Um, I remember that was because of deadlines that we didn't have enough time to create or explore another project.

Um, I just want to make sure that we do have like in the future that agenda that on the agenda so that we don't miss those deadlines.

We have the opportunity to like open the door to spending the money somewhere else.

If so, because I remember that that was the main reason, right?

It was like we were past the deadline and we don't have time anymore left to try to reallocate this money anywhere else.

Well, I want to want to respect the I want to respect the agenda, but the reality is is that I think the commission's expectation was based on the prior year that there would be a demand and a quality of applications for the grants program that we wouldn't be looking at that that kind of money left, and then um for the deadline you were talking about is it's extremely difficult to do something new because you've got to figure out what that project is, you have to get proposals, you have to get a contract, you then have to get insurance and all the things to do a contract.

And I've been down this road and they're just a tremendous amount of work.

So to try to do that as we close in on the end of the fiscal year is extremely difficult.

Well, no, I know that that was the main reason we couldn't.

And and if I may add this, the the comedy uh formerly the comedy and the plaza, now we're we've expanded to this festival.

It is the piece that keeps getting mentioned.

You know, everything that that the commission and the library have done.

Uh well, I was I'll say primarily the I think the commission has done this program comes up over and over again.

So it's worthy of the support.

No doubt about that.

Um, but I I just I wanted someone to like jog my memory and remind me like did we miss a deadline?

That's why we couldn't open a project or have anything else on the table, even considered.

And then I briefly remember us saying, like, oh, for the next year we'll make sure that that this you know this doesn't happen like because it's possible.

We could I think it might be worth agendizing uh like we've done in the past uh several years, um several, the last couple of years, thinking about what the priorities are going to be for this.

Yeah, I think so.

Okay.

We've typically done that in July.

Um I think we skipped August.

But anyway, we'll put that, we'll put that on an agenda to talk about what the commission would like to consider for the uh for the expenditure of that those funds.

Yeah, another factor of that is perhaps for next year we can move up the grant program a little bit to give us more time at the end, if that's possible.

If something else, so instead of six weeks, we would have 10 weeks or something to that.

So we'll add that to the uh prioritization of the plans for the fiscal year 26 budget.

Um any other comments or reports?

I have one.

So kind of writing on the coattails of the success of Game of Shrooms.

Um I was recently talking with uh library former colleague of mine who works in film archives, and she was telling me about this event called Home Movie Day.

Um that is it's an international event where libraries, museums, community centers, people from the public can bring their home movies to have them inspected and played at the library.

So oftentimes this is because they're on like eight millimeter film or 16 millimeter or you know, even VHS, like a lot of people don't have a VCR these days.

Um, and a film archivist is there to receive these, clean them up, and then project them for the community so that they can see them.

I know that the library has a digital memory station.

Um I don't know if it's equipped with any of that, but I think it's just like a really neat event for people to come share their history, like most likely local history of San Leandro, for wanting to highlight more of those stories.

Um, and then it's usually, you know, like a volunteer film archivist or projectionist comes and helps facilitate.

Um so I have an email out to my friend who who does this and to learn more about what would it take to host such an event?

But um, I think it's on October 18th this year, but it doesn't have to be that day, it can really be whenever we want.

Um, but I wanted to throw that out there as an idea and maybe an agenda item for us to explore.

Um, and you know, if there's somebody on the library staff that I could talk to about if there's appetite for that, or if that's your schedule's already full for the year.

Yeah, but again, kind of high impact, low cost, bringing people out to share their stories.

So that is my piece.

So uh do I have a motion to adjourn the meeting of June 17th, 2025?

My motion.

Do you have a second?

I'll second.

All right.

Uh any discussion?

Hearing none.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

And any opposed?

Alright, motion carried.

The meeting of June 17th, 2025 is adjourned at 740.